As I walked in my neighborhood this afternoon, I thought about one of my recent walks and its discoveries and adventures that I’d never finished writing about. This time, as I went at my usual fast-walk-quick-stop pace, occasionally lingering for a longer-than-quick gaze or sniff, the idea of a new series (or at least category) of posts came to me. I would write about one thing from my own garden and one from my explorations, and that might facilitate shorter articles than usual, making them easier to fit into my current busyness.
So here goes:
In the fall of 2016 I planted lots of irises, mostly in the purple category. This one that just started blooming, a tall one that doesn’t seem to be a repeater, is called Jazzed Up Tall. If it’s going to bloom late, it’s a good thing it is tall, so we can see it above the poppies and wallflowers.
Beyond my garden, only a block away from home I came upon the giant feijoa bush that I wrote about before; it was severely pruned last fall just before its fruit might have ripened. Today I found it at the beginning of bloom, the first delectable flowers opened; knowing that they would go to waste if left on the plant, I picked quite a few and carried them home in my shirttail.
When I emptied them into a bowl, an earwig ran out on to the floor. An hour later I began to pull off the petals, and jumped when another earwig appeared. He must have been hiding in a curled up petal as in a cave.
If I knew someone who needed a birthday cake this month, I would bake one just so I could decorate with these flowers (after examining each petal for stowaways). But I don’t, so I ate the petals for dessert with a bit of cream.
Gladsome Lights 
I did not know you could eat the flowers! How interesting.
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You don’t mention what the flowers taste like. Are they sweet? They certainly are pretty! So is that Iris. It picks up the colour in that flowering plant just to the left of it.
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I did say they were delectable, but that doesn’t say in what way. They are very sweet, and fruity, but they lack the foxy flavor of the guavas themselves.
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Flower petals and cream. Who wooda thunk it?!? 😉
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I don’t know this plant at all, so had fun googling it. We eat the flowers of Black Locust (Akac Fa) at this time of year. They are not quite ready yet….And the honey made from them is my favorite in all the world.
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Ooooh, I didn’t know the Black Locust were edible – we have them growing by the creek, and I just noticed the first blooms this week!! I should gather them now after they’ve been rain-washed. Thanks for the tip! (Do you put cream on, too?)
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Akac Fa is the Hungarian name of Black Locust. You can google it, but I think you won’t get an English website. I hope this answers your email about a typo.
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The sight of those feijoa flowers sparked a dim memory and I looked up the plant – I knew it as a pineapple guava, and when I was in high school my parents rented a home in the middle of an avocado grove. The driveway was lined with these pineapple guavas. I had no idea the flowers are edible! I haven’t seen these plants in over 50 years! Now I want one! 😉
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You should get two or three! I bet you’d get plenty of fruit, too, down there where it is more the proper climate. And they are so beautiful, too!
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